New Cyberbullying Law Would Let Canadian Government Hack your Electronic Devices

Nothing says Totalitarian Dictatorship like spying on your citizens to make sure they aren’t getting up to anything mischievous.

The internet is a complex demon. It’s filled with insight, a vast spectrum of opinions, humour, cats, porn, weird porn, and even weirder porn. As we progress through the 21st Century, it seems that every government around the world is trying to pass laws so they can gain control of the Internet, and every time, the government usually fails.

Introducing the latest and greatest attempt for the Canadian Government to regulate the internet: a new “Cyberbullying” bill.

So what is this new bill?

Bill C-13, proposed by the Harper Government, is a self claimed cyberbullying legislation that has a few small foot notes that say the bill would allow the police to remotely hack into computers to gain information, and track where that computer is moving.

Basically, this bill allows police to do everything they currently need a warrant to do without actually getting a warrant.

Sure, according to Bill C-13, police need to get a judge’s approval in order to hack into someone’s computer/laptop/GPS/cellphone, but it isn’t a requirement for the government to keep track of how many people’s devices are being hacked. It could be anywhere from 1, to 10,000,000 million a year. And you won’t even know if you’re being watched.

Furthermore, Bill C-13 allows the government to create something to perform any number of activities to track your information and location. Many people, including Christopher Parsons, a posdoctoral at the Citizen Lab in the Munk School of Global Affairs, say that the government may use harmful malware and viruses to infect people’s computers through spam e-mails.

You know those messages you randomly get that say things like “Omg! Have you seen this photo of you? You look so bad in it! Click here to see it:”. Yeah. Like that.

Canada isn’t the first country to try and pass a bill like this, either. Recently, the German government have been use a trojan virus to listen in on people’s Skype conversations. The United States National Security Agency has also created viruses to monitor millions of computers.

They might as well stick cameras in our televisions.

Police warrants last two months for most crimes, but warrants are extended to a year if the crime is terrorism-related or if the suspect is a member, or connected to, a criminal organization.

The vagueness of the bill says that it wants to protect the general populous from bullies, but the actual wording on the bill has expanded the definition of bullies to include whoever they feel like.

Experts fear that if this bill passes, the vagueness of Bill C-13 will give the Canadian government unprecedented control and surveillance of its citizens.

Remember all of those illegally downloaded songs, movies, games, and torrents you have on your computer, wouldn’t it be a shame if the government suddenly had the authority to scan your computer, find all that illegal content, and throw your ass in prison for it?

Bill C-13 is entering the House of Commons justice committee this week, so it isn’t too late for this monstrosity to be shot down. To ensure that it doesn’t pass, please call your local representative and say “Dude, wtf? Don’t pass this goddamnit.”